


Like You Mean It

by swooning



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Post-Hogwarts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-08
Updated: 2015-04-08
Packaged: 2018-03-21 19:51:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 17,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3703445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swooning/pseuds/swooning
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hermione finally gets all the time in the library she could ever ask for. But will her favorite fellow bookworm be joining her or not? A post-war, post-7th year fic. </p><p>(Originally posted at Ashwinder; this fic was written before the release of Half-Blood Prince).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Bit of Tedious Exposition

 

All term long, she had been waiting. Patiently, she watched. She suspected that his private collection contained more than enough to keep him informed, but still… there must come a time when he needed it. When he needed her in order to get it. Because now, she was the one in control. Now she was the only one who could give out the password to enter the Restricted Section without her assistance.  

Hermione had never considered the unique power her new position as Hogwarts librarian afforded her, until one day she had seen him stalk up to the rope sectioning off that portion of the library he loved best, mutter some outdated password, try and fail to enter, then go all sour as he slowly realized that the newest staff member must have changed it. Snape had scowled, as only he could, and whirled around to approach her desk in a breathtaking flurry of bat-black robes. He took two steps in her direction, as she watched through her concealing veil of curls. Then a dead stop, another muttered word that was most certainly not a password, and he had stormed out of the library and not been back since. 

She carried that vision of bitter, black-eyed hubris into her dreams that night, and many more nights afterwards, supplementing the substantial bank of similar images that had fueled her erotic inner life since sometime in the summer before her final year at Hogwarts. Since the first time she had seen Snape returning to 12 Grimmauld Place, as battered as a person could be and still Apparate, and had been the only one on hand to help Molly Weasley nurse him back to health. She had seen, as he lay moaning and defenseless from the lingering effects of the Cruciatus Curse, the fine scars both old and new that made a map of his body. Molly had known just what to do because, as Hermione learned, she'd had to help Snape on more occasions than she could count. Cruciatus, sometimes Slicing Hexes or other magics that weren't Unforgiveables but should be. All had left marks, some on Snape's body but all on his mind, and Hermione ached to realize how much pain Snape had suffered, and how much he would probably go on to suffer, all on behalf of people who would never call him friend. 

By the time Snape was restored to his usual snarky self and departed her care, Hermione had found herself a new hero. More heroic than Harry, in her eyes, because whereas Harry in his heart of hearts actually expected to defeat Voldemort and emerge victorious one day, Snape did what he did for the Order in the full expectation he would die painfully in the process. And go to his end unmourned, possibly with some of the very people he had helped coming to his funeral only to dance on his grave. 

And then one night, because she was a seventeen-year-old girl with all the normal hormones of her peer group, her heroic fantasies took a decidedly different track, and she experienced her first nocturnal orgasm in a wild quasi-nightmare of an erotic dream that featured Snape, an ebony four-poster bed in the middle of the Potions classroom, and a knickerless but otherwise properly uniformed Hermione screaming "Severus" as she writhed beneath her Potions master in ecstasy while a group of jealous Slytherins sobbed at the nearby lab table. And after that dream, she recalled now with a wistful half-smile, things had just never been quite the same. 

When Hermione left Hogwarts after graduation, the world was her oyster. She had not only taken Os in all her N.E.W.T.s, she had performed better in more subjects than any student in Hogwarts history. And, though Harry and some of the other muggle-born students thought her quite mad, she had also taken extra correspondence courses in muggle chemistry, biology, maths, and psychology, studying them to A-level, blowing the top off those exams as well. Just in case she needed a fall-back position, she reasoned. Hermione was nothing if not prepared for any future that might befall her. But for once, her strenuous preparation actually hurt rather than hindered; she found herself unable to choose between all the options available to her. With Voldemort defeated, and Ron and Harry off to train as Aurors, Hermione's life lacked direction and purpose. 

At first, this hadn't been evident. Feted as one of the guiding architects of the recent victory, Hermione took advantage of the giddy post-war period to take a sort of Grand Tour. She and Luna Lovegood had spent a highly enjoyable and educational six months traveling the world, visiting wizarding enclaves and lesser-known magical locales, arguing good-naturedly about where to go next and whether or not one might see a Blibbering Humdinger there. But once they had returned to England, and things had begun settling down, Hermione realized she still had no idea what to do with her future. 

Then, she had received the letter from Madame Maxime, with whom she and Luna had become reacquainted while visiting Beauxbatons during their travels. Maxime reported that her dear friend Robert de Sortilège—the director of La Bibliothèque Magique Consolidée de l'Europe, Europe's oldest, largest, and indisputably finest library of magical texts—was in something of a bind. Having just lost a promising young special-collections apprentice to a nasty splinching mishap, he desperately need a replacement, preferably one who read quickly, learned quickly, and had a feel for acquiring books. The greatest need was for someone who spoke English and would therefore be able to communicate with the key British wizarding contacts in the semi-magical Welsh village of Hay-on-Wye (through which every book ever published must inevitably travel, and where all searches for rare books of muggle or magical nature logically began). Did Maxime, by any chance, have any recent graduates of Beauxbatons to recommend? Although none of her own students fit the bill, Maxime had immediately thought of "'Ermione," and owled her straight away. 

So it was that, just two weeks later, Hermione found herself settling in to a tiny flat over a patisserie on the Rue en Longueur, the famous "Sideways Street" of the Paris wizarding community. For almost three and a half years—during which she had no real adventures of the type that had marked her Hogwarts days, but enjoyed herself nonetheless—Hermione applied her considerable energy and talents to learning the world's most impressive magical library like the back of her hand. Within six months, the head circulations librarian had maneuvered Hermione out of special collections and into her own department as her assistant. And in another year, Monsieur de Sortilège, finally catching on to the intense young Englishwoman's potential, had ratcheted her still further up the administrative ladder by securing her to be his own assistant. So he really had nobody but himself to blame when Hermione left to replace Madame Pince at Hogwarts the next school term; as she pointed out—and de Sortilège was forced to agree—without his mentorship, a witch as young as she would have never gained enough experience in the administration of the library to be a likely candidate to head a collection as substantial as that housed at Britain's premier school of Witchcraft and Wizardry. 

And now here she was, Hermione mused to herself, in charge of a fine library indeed, plenty of responsibility for a young witch of only twenty-one to be going on with. And what had she been spending her valuable time on recently? Deciding which password to the Restricted Section best suited her nefarious purposes. But once she got it—once she realized simplicity was the key—she knew she'd made the perfect choice.

Dumbledore, one of the first to use the section after the change in passwords, hardly had to say the new word at all. His eloquent face, even his very soul, spoke it in volumes, and into the Restricted Section he happily hummed, the thick gold rope lifting of its own accord to admit him then coiling its loose, tasseled, end carefully back around its hook. Minerva was brisk and authoritative, and sounded as if she were answering a question to which she had no doubt of the answer. Rolanda, who didn't actually need to enter the Section in the ordinary course of her teaching year, had tested the password just for fun, blasting it out and punching a victorious fist in the air as she vaulted the rope. 

But Snape just couldn't do it. He could say the word, of course, said it often in the course of a day (though perhaps not as often as most). But Hermione had gained some subtlety in her days and nights immersed in the great wizarding books of Europe at the B.M.C.E., and immersed in conversation with those visiting great authors or scholars of Europe who had become taken with the young, rosy-cheeked, blisteringly smart British librarian. So she had added a twist of her own to the password charm, and it was the twist that kept Snape out of the Restricted Section even after he'd heard the word and the added rule. The factor she had worked in was that, no matter who was speaking and how their personal psychology impacted on the rule of the charm, they not only had to speak the password...they had to _mean_ it. 

This requirement seemed especially hard on Snape, and Hermione wasn't above making the most of his struggle. Whenever he lurked by the entrance to the Restricted Section, fretting and frowning, she found excuses to go in there. She said the password in something like a moan, with a breathy smile and half-lidded eyes, as if she were in the throes of a quiet but deeply satisfying orgasm: 

"Yeessss….."

And the magical field barring access to the Restricted Section melted to welcome her in, the rope curling out of the way almost sensuously, then returning snakelike to its hook with sudden speed, the protective ward flicking back into place before Snape could sneak in behind her.  


 

  
***  


 

  
Snape thought nobody was looking, the first time he tried. Foolish to think so, really, since anybody who knew her ought to know that Hermione, once in possession of an entire library, was highly unlikely to leave it unless absolutely necessary. But Snape assumed her safely in bed when he came, after patrolling the halls, hoping to do a little private research in the holy of holies. With an even more acid sneer than usual, Snape approached the rope and intoned the new password with disgust. 

"Yes," he snarked, almost walking into the field of restriction which had not responded to him in the slightest. 

"Yesss," he hissed a bit more loudly, through clenched teeth. Dark brows flew together over black eyes in a ferocious glare. Now he whispered, threateningly, " _Yes_."

While any student would surely have dissolved into a whimpering mass at this vision of Snape, the rope to the Restricted Section remained unperturbed. Had it been a person, it would have been buffing its fingernails on its robes and examining them with a bored expression. Snape responded to it accordingly, and pulled his wand out to try blasting through, when he heard a polite cough from behind the roped-off doorway and raised his eyes to see the new librarian observing him curiously. 

"Professor Snape, are you preparing to hex that rope?" she asked, her lips twitching in an obvious effort to avoid a smile. 

"Miss Granger, " he growled furiously, "I am merely attempting to enter the Restricted Section of this institution's library, a privilege I enjoy as an instructor here, and I do not appreciate your blatant effort to hinder me." 

"I beg your pardon," said Hermione, quelling the irksome smile, "but nobody else seems to have any difficulty with the password, Professor. Perhaps you might try it again, let me see if everything's in order?" 

Because he could not manage to construe a hidden motive in her offer (and because he desperately wanted to consult at Mangrove and Splonck's definitive, but unfortunately dark-magic-adjacent, treatise on the properties of various magical fungi of the world's rainforest regions) he finally relented. 

"Yes," he muttered grumpily. 

"Ah. I see." Hermione nodded knowingly, infuriating him. The corners of her full lips quirked once, drawing attention to her mouth. Snape noted the lush pink tone, and wondered in passing whether it were the result of a potion or simply her natural coloring. 

"What do you mean you _see_? What is there to see? I said the password, I expect to be admitted into this section at once,” he stormed. 

"I meant I understand where your problem lies, Professor.” She finally let the smile work its way onto her lips…or perhaps, Snape thought, it was simply beyond her power to control her mirth in the face of his discomfort. "It's not just a conventional password. There's another layer of security, an idea I borrowed from someone who used to frequent the B.M.C.E. The protective spell is imbued with a requirement that the word be spoken as if the speaker really meant it. In other words, the rope isn't lifting because the field can tell you don't really mean your 'yes'." 

He stared at her, aghast, as the implication sunk in. "This is preposterous, Miss Granger. And in any case, I don't have time to waste with this. I'd sooner just order another copy of Mangrove and Splonck.” 

He'd spent more than enough thought and patience on this idiocy. He started to stomp off before her words caught him mid-stride. 

"A pity… I just got a large new box of vintage dark magic periodicals from one of my American contacts in New Orleans, and I must say I could've used your opinion on a few things …" 

Snape turned, unable to resist the lure of all the potential information contained in the forbidden portion of the library. He had to find a way in. 

Prowling back to the rope, he thought for a moment, then envisioned Harry Potter in his student days, standing in front of a bubbling cauldron of bubotuber pus. In his mind's eye, the cauldron exploded, and the Boy Who Still Nauseated One fell to the ground in a screaming, boil-covered heap. With a sinister curl of his lips, Snape kept this vision in mind and drawled an unpleasant, "Yes."

Nothing. 

"Hmmm… nothing." confirmed Hermione. "Not a sausage. Sorry, Professor, I just can't think what it… oh, wait," and she grinned perkily, clearly pleased to have a solution for him, "I'll wager you were thinking of something nasty, weren't you? Only that won't work for this, you see. That obeys the letter but not the spirit of the spell, which values meaning what you say on a more holistic level. Your ‘yes’ didn't really get into the spirit of 'yesness.' Not just simple truth-telling, but more the 'Everlasting Yes' sort of feeling. Simply intending the literal meaning of what you say, as you say it, isn't quite the thing. Sorry." She sighed prettily, seeming genuinely apologetic. "Well, sir, if there's nothing else I can help you with, I have quite a bit of cataloguing to do." And she gave a little wave before disappearing into the stacks of the Restricted Section, leaving Snape alone with the rope, his wand, and his black, black, thoughts of Harry and now Hermione, encrusted with supparating bubotuber boils.   


 

  
***  


 

  
Tears of laughter poured down Hermione's face, and she grasped Ginny's arm for support as they made their way into the Three Broomsticks and sat down at their favorite table near the corner. Fortunately, it was the middle of the afternoon, and a light snow seemed to be discouraging people from venturing out, so the pub was not very crowded. Even so, they both failed to recognize the cloaked figure slumping sulkily two tables over, even when they scanned the room to look for people they knew. 

"I can't believe they're not here yet," whined Ginny, giving the proprietor a wave and pantomiming a request for two hot butterbeers before resuming her seat. "We're never going to get all the Christmas shopping done. And it's only four days away. So, what are you going to do next?" 

"What next?" Hermione made a show of removing her cloak and brushing the snow off it. "Nothing serious, I suppose. I don't think he really notices me, so it's all just for amusement value at this point anyway. Poor thing, he's really a little dense, isn't he?" 

Ginny nodded. "Aren't they all? More's the pity. Still, otherwise they wouldn't be nearly such easy prey, would they?"

"Truer words were never spoken, dearie," agreed Rosmerta, plunking down their two mugs of hot butterbeer. "And who's the particular prey today, eh?" She winked broadly. 

"Rosmerta, you wouldn't believe it if I told you. And neither would he, so I don't know why I'm bothering.” And Hermione laughed as the robust barkeeper pulled a comically lewd face before sweeping away to the next table. 

"Oi, Ginny, Hermione," a familiar voice cried suddenly from the door. Two cloaked, bescarved bundles unwrapped themselves to reveal Ron and Harry, rosy-cheeked and sniffling from the cold; they pulled up chairs, causing the girls to have to rearrange themselves at the smallish table, and noisily called out to Rosmerta for two more butterbeers. 

"Oh my. How very exciting," deadpanned Ginny. "If it isn't the two saviors of the Western Wizarding World come to join us. However shall we restrain our enthusiasm, Hermione?"

Hermione’s face was equally straight. ”Restraint will come to us gradually after we've spent so many agonizing days in the long queue of women waiting to fling their willing selves at the feet of the cream of Wizardkind.” 

"At their feet? Really? I would've rather thought…" mused Ginny delicately.

"Ha. Ha ha ha," interrupted the primary savior in question. "We were unavoidably detained. Arthur has a new car, and he needed me to help him figure out why the brakes didn't work."

"Couldn't you have done it later?"

"The brakes, Hermione. He was getting ready to drive it. Right then."

"Oh." 

"But once we've warmed up a bit, we can get started on the shopping, all right?"

Their conversation turned to the coming holiday, and who still needed to purchase what for whom. It was obvious the girls had completed nearly all their shopping and needed only a few final trinkets, whereas the boys had purchased nothing at all and had no idea what to get for anyone. 

And all the while, the cloaked figure—with his back toward them, but with a sense of hearing any bat would envy—listened with only the occasional soft, mean-spirited snicker. An unrequited love for the insufferable little password-complicating bookworm, was it? For either Potter or Weasley, undoubtedly. How revolting. Yet, how full of intriguing potential for humiliating or manipulating her. At last, he might have the leverage he needed.

For Snape knew perhaps better than was strictly good for him that knowledge, however sneakily attained, was power. And power was exactly what he felt he needed to gain over Hermione Granger, the Gryffindor Who Wouldn't Stay Gone.

 


	2. Matters Proceed Apace

Snape's plan to damage Hermione's self-esteem and make her miserable for his own entertainment might have been effective, had Hermione in fact been unrequited of a love for either Harry or Ron. As it was, he just grew more confused, over the next few days, as Hermione breezed happily about the near-empty school, admiring the Christmas decorations, leaving little presents for her fellow staff members, and pulling crackers on Christmas morning with as much enthusiasm as the students and Dumbledore.

At every opportunity Snape tried making cutting remarks about her friends, but she seemed unruffled by it. In fact she rather seemed oddly eager to continue conversing with him. She managed to engage him, several times, in conversations about the dark magic-influenced book collection she was in the process of expanding, and he found himself unaccountably satisfied when she thanked him with seeming sincerity for his expert opinions.   
  
On one notable occasion, he wound up remaining by the counter in the library for close to two hours, completely unaware of the time, as he talked with the young librarian about a range of topics from an article in the Daily Prophet to the proper time of year to harvest belladonna. Afterwards, when she had gone to help a student locate a particular book, and he finally noticed the time and snuck out, he realized he couldn't remember why he'd gone to the library in the first place. And he couldn't remember what had drawn him to the desk to speak with Hermione; he could only recall feeling slightly hypnotized by the sound of her voice, the look of her face turning from playful to serious as she spoke in turn to him and to the few students brave enough to approach the desk for assistance while Snape was there.  _She actually seems not to mind spending time with me. This will never do,_  he told himself, but without much conviction.  
  
To his surprise, when he arrived at the Great Hall for breakfast on Christmas morning Snape found a small, neatly wrapped package waiting in his chair at the head table. Looking about him suspiciously, he finally placed the package in front of him and sat down. It felt like a book. There was a small envelope on top, which he deemed safest to open first. The unsigned note inside said simply: "to tide you over, until you mean it." He unwrapped the bright red paper with neat, precise movements, not tearing it even a tiny bit, and pulled the gift free from its trimmings. There, in front of him, was a copy of Mangrove and Splonck's slim volume entitled From the Amazon to the Laboratory: the Uses of Rainforest Fungi in Potions Dark and Light.   
  
He looked up to see Hermione, a few chairs down on the other side of Dumbledore, in a spirited conversation with the Headmaster; that same esteemed gentleman was already sporting three colorful, flimsy, paper hats from the growing pile of pulled crackers in front of him. She saw Snape look her way, and caught his eye with a grin and the quickest of winks.

Still in shock at the receipt of a Christmas present, and entirely unsure how to react, Snape held her gaze for longer than he meant to. Her smile slowly shifted, and Snape was if anything even more unsure what to make of the dreamy expression that floated across her features before she caught herself and dropped her eyes with a sudden, furious, blush.

Snape's body was smarter than his brain, and his prick suddenly twitched in his lap.   
  
He looked back at the book he held, and pondered things for a moment behind what he hoped was an impassive, unreadable mask. Around and around the rusty gears turned in the part of his brain that was meant to deal with sex and relationships at the same time. One at a time, the pieces of information went into the mill for processing:  _Somebody she likes doesn't notice her… she gave me a present… she remembered the authors of this book when I only mentioned them in passing… somebody doesn't notice her and so she's just amusing herself… she doesn't care when I insult her precious Potter and Weasley…she just smiled at me, how very odd, perhaps she's mentally deficient in some way? No, no, she's clearly intelligent … she blushed… she gave me this because… she's making fun of me? No… but there seems to be amusement value… so that means…_ Snape's prick twitched again, just once, hopefully.  _She… fancies me?_

The thought had trouble remaining in his brain. It was simply too preposterous to consider. Women did not fancy him. They feared him, or were revolted by him, or on very rare occasions had desultory sex with him if paid to do so. And when did he start thinking of Hermione Granger as a woman, anyway?  _She's a little girl, a silly little… bits of her aren't all that little… but silly, and – Oh, sod it._  
  
He picked absently at his breakfast, working on convincing himself that the gift was somehow meant to ridicule. This was by far easier and safer to contemplate than any of the possible alternative theories. By the time he'd finished eating, he had worked up enough indignation to give Hermione a quick but concentrated glare before he swooped silently from the hall, replying to Dumbledore's "Happy Christmas, Severus!" with only the curtest of nods. Hermione didn't seem to notice the glare, lost as she apparently was was in a happier reverie of her own. But she did notice his exit when he was nearly to the door, and gave chase after exchanging hurried Christmas greetings and hugs with a few of the other staff at the head table.   
  
"Professor," she called after him as he turned to enter the hallway that led to the dungeon stairs, "Wait! I need to ask you something!" A little breathless, she caught up to him as he swirled around. 

He was ready, if necessary, to lash out in retribution if this was to be further teasing about the book. "What is it now, Miss Granger?"  
  
"Well, Professor, I find myself in a bit of a dilemma, and I thought you might be able to help. You see, the students don't misbehave much in the library, and so I rarely get the opportunity to give detentions." She paused to catch her breath, giving him a chance to take a dig.  
  
"And so you would like my advice in how to give more detentions? You've certainly come to the right place." He smirked, raising an ironic eyebrow, only realizing the inherent humor after he'd said it. After a moment, Hermione's laugh filled the narrow hallway, and Snape smiled in return, albeit uncomfortably. He was wrong about the book being a prank, he knew with an almost palpable thud of certainty. Dead wrong. And he had no idea at all how to proceed now it was clear that, for whatever deranged reason, she seemed to be pursuing him.  
  
"I should know all about that, of course, considering how many I've seen you hand out," she admitted. "But no, that isn't quite what I had in mind. I just realized that, unless things have changed drastically in the past few years, you're about to have a brisk season for detentions once the students come back from the holiday. You always did give a lot then, as everybody comes back to school so keyed up. So what I really need is to, well… borrow some of your extra detention students for my own purposes."

Snape gave a little "ah" of understanding, and stopped to consider her request. While his first instinct was to deny her on general principle, the Slytherin in him couldn't resist the possibility of a quid pro quo. She would owe him something, and that held an undeniable appeal.   
  
"And just what would these purposes be, Miss Granger?" he enquired silkily.   
  
"Oh, erm, well… nothing too sinister. I'm doing some cleaning, and some reorganization in the stacks. I need help with moving and relabeling the books, and updating the catalogues." She looked up at him impishly, evidently emboldened by his earlier joke. "And it won't do to have anyone too cretinous. Some of these first-years look as if they wouldn't know how to spell their own names, much less handle a book. So, you know, if you could particularly encourage a little misbehavior on the part of some older Ravenclaws or Slytherins, with perhaps a brawny but good-natured Gryffindor or Hufflepuff thrown in for some of the heavier lifting, that would really be ideal."   
  
It was Snape's turn to laugh, a deep baritone peal that he wasn't sure had ever issued from his throat before. It felt strange but good, creating the same warmth in his chest that he experienced whenever the resident Potions dungeon cat curled up on him during his office naps. 

  
"I believe I can accommodate your request, Miss Granger, provided the students oblige by behaving in their usual imbecilic fashion. There is rarely a shortage of idiots deserving detention for their inability to conduct themselves properly in the potions lab." His eyes met hers, and a lazy flicker of heat brushed every one of his nerve endings into a state of irritated ecstasy.  _I'd like to conduct myself improperly in the potions lab all over you._

As if she'd heard his thoughts, a blush spread onto her cheeks. Her voice remained steady, however, betraying no surge of any particular response that might have caused a blush response. 

"Well, then. Thank you very much for your assistance, Professor. Any night after dinner will be acceptable, and the students can come in jeans and trainers, as they'll be likely to get a bit dusty. Just send me a note to let me know when you've got some victims for me."  
  
"My pleasure, Miss Granger." And he walked away quickly, before she could see the blush he felt rising on his own cheeks in response to hers. 

  
***

  
Working his way through the classroom, prowling between the rows, he could hear the dolts whispering. Finely honed instinct told him it had nothing to do with the Draught of Peace. He sidled closer to the offensive noise, on the pretext of observing the students at an adjacent table, and eavesdropped on the two behind him while he watched the pair before him grow nervous and begin dropping things.   
  
"It was bloody awful. My arms and legs are still aching, all those trips up and down the ladders. And no sleep. Hell, we were there until close to midnight."   
  
"Cor, I thought she'd be easier than Snape or Filch."  
  
"It was even worse for MacIntosh. He was there on her own detention. He was still there when the rest of us left, the poor bloke…"  
  
" _Her_ detention? In the library? What did he do to earn a detention in the library?"   
  
The first student lowered his voice even further, and whispered with an audible shudder: "He accidentally tore a page out of a book."

The pair fell into a hushed moment of shared horror at the thought of the dire fate likely to have befallen MacIntosh for this egregious error. Unseen by them, Snape suppressed a snicker before he rounded on the whispering pair with a thinly masked unholy glee in his eyes.   
  
"Dickens! Mordrant! Two points each from Ravenclaw for talking out of turn. And detention tonight for both of you." He drew out his sentence, milking the maximum enjoyment from the expressions on their despairing faces. "After dinner you shall report...  _to the library_." 

  
***

  
"I still need more help," she insisted, "Madame Pince left a great deal in disarray, and her filing system was hopelessly outmoded. And Filch never cleans the books, just the floor, so everything's coated with dust. You can't possibly expect me to believe you haven't given any detentions in four days." Hermione pricked her head at him speculatively. "You're keeping them for yourself, aren't you?"   
  
She thought Snape was beginning to be able to tell, now, when she was teasing. This had taken some time, and he always seemed rather chuffed with himself when he was able to snark back at her.   
  
"Of course I am, Miss Granger. Do you think I have no cleaning to be done? No ingredients to organize? Must I sacrifice my entire potential labor force to your rabid obsession for order?" He waggled his raven eyebrows at her in mock menace, and took a bracing sip of black coffee.

If others at the staff table noticed the odd behavior of their colleague, they said nothing for fear of breaking the spell. For the first time in memory, Severus had actually been bearable around the staff room and at meals, and nobody wanted things to revert to the way they had been before the new librarian appropriated the chair next to his at the head table.

"No, in truth," Snape continued, "the students are simply so cowed into submission by you that they are all behaving like proverbial little angels in order to avoid a possible detention. Rumors of your brutal requirements have swept through the school like a plague. It's quite appalling, really."  
  
"You're joking," said Hermione incredulously. "All I'm having them do is help around the library." She grinned a little sheepishly, considering this, then giggled. "Until midnight. With no breaks. Climbing up and down two-story ladders with huge stacks of books in their arms. Dusty, mildewy, books with the occasional very large spider in. But," she protested, "It's no more than I'm doing myself."   
  
"Perhaps your enthusiasm for the work gives you particular energy for it," Snape commented dryly. "We all know how you feel about books."   
  
"There's the pot calling the kettle black," she snipped back at him, eliciting a rueful nod of admission. "How was the Mangrove and Splonck, by the way? Useful?"  
  
"To a degree. Thank you. Need I return it?"   
  
"Oh, no, that was a copy from the private collection of Hermione Granger. Something I picked up a few years ago in Brazil, but never ended up reading. I like finding those sort of crossover books, you get them a lot more in Europe and South America than you do here or in the U.S., that seem to ignore the distinction between light and dark magic in favor of a more pragmatic, outcome-oriented… " She was puzzled to find Snape looking at her with a strangely intense, questioning cast to his eyes. "What?" She surreptitiously ran her tongue over the front of her teeth, feeling for any breakfast remains that might be drawing unwanted attention.   
  
"Hermione, you're… an extremely  _odd_  woman," he said, with the same intensity. It didn't sound quite as much like an insult as it probably ought to.

She considered his words briefly, weighing her response. "Severus." She paused, giving him the chance to challenge her familiarity before going on, "Are you attempting to tell me I'm unlike any woman you've ever met?" She hoped her soft, affectionate tone made it clear she was genuinely asking, not challenging.   
  
"If I say yes, will you let me into your Restricted Section?"  
  
His eyes held hers in a stare that was longer than strictly appropriate for colleagues, and each suddenly recognized the other's intensity for the raw want that it was. Hermione's nipples hardened with a flush that swept down to her lap and throbbed uselessly in the gathering dampness. From the way Snape shifted in his chair, she suspected he was in the same type of discomfort.   
  
"This is the Great Hall. At breakfast. And everyone can see us." She said in a near-whisper, as much to remind herself as to remind him, and she tore her eyes away from his.

She could almost feel the heat rising from his body as he maintained his stare for a moment longer, then looked down at his coffee cup, breathing heavily.  _Surely_ , she thought,  _everyone must have seen that; it was like a big neon sign over our heads blinking "they're going to shag, they're going to shag."_  But a quick scan of the hall reassured her that, in fact, the students and staff had remained largely oblivious to this little interchange. Dumbledore, of course, was smiling beatifically under his beard and cutting his eyes over at them; but Hermione assumed that Dumbledore always knew everything, anyway, and that if he had disapproved he would have said something when she asked to move her seat at table.   
  
"Well." Snape began.  
  
"Mmmm?"  
  
He straightened in his seat, flexed his elongated features into something like their usual sourness, and gathered his thoughts, then tried again.   
  
"This is Friday."  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"Your fortune may be about to take a turn for the better. Fridays are historically known to be rife with behavior deserving detentions. And I have fourth-year Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs last thing. They'll be far more interested in the Ravenclaw-Gryffindor match than anything my class has on offer. Rufus Abbot, in particular, is apt to ignore his potions of a Friday in favor of whispering to his cronies about the latest issue of  _Which Broomstick?_  A strapping lad of very little brain. He should suit your needs admirably. For carrying books," he amended hastily.   
  
"Sounds perfect. Pity you can't guarantee his detention beforehand, but one can't have everything, I suppose."  
  
"No, indeed. And perhaps, Miss Granger, I should avail myself of this opportunity to observe precisely what has the students so put off at your detentions."   
  
"You're more than welcome, Professor," she said, a trifle breathily, "although of course I will expect you to help if you're there. You may want to wear something a bit less, erm, formal." She rose abruptly, preparing to leave, but turned at the last moment and leaned in a little too close, murmuring in Snape's ear. "And perhaps our mutual enthusiasm for the work will bring us to some uniquely…  _satisfying_ … conclusions." And with that she dashed off.

Snape, however, was stuck in his chair for several minutes longer before he was finally able to arise and stalk out without having to hunch over to hide his reaction.


	3. Awaiting the Inevitable

Rufus Abbot never stood a chance. From the moment Snape swept into his fourth-year class, eyes snapping and upper lip curling, it was clear that somebody would be suffering much before the day was out. Rufus fell first, to be followed by his Hufflepuff confidante, and a little later by a Ravenclaw who let out an extremely injudicious expletive when her lab partner knocked a bowl of newly shredded shrivelfigs off the table.   
  
The students all assumed Snape's unusually sharp tongue and seeming eagerness to give detentions were the result of a very bad mood; of course, they were too young to appreciate that, as was the case with many adults, the most dangerous Snape was actually a Snape in a very good mood. Of course, they'd all had very limited exposure to that sort of Snape. But today, the Professor was on top of his game. He barely felt the Potions lab floor beneath his boots as he swooped and pounced, challenging and tasking his students, his overactive mind jumping between at least three places. The lab, of course. But also his closet, trying to recall if he even owned jeans and trainers or their equivalent, or would need to transform something. And, of course, the library later that night...

  
***

  
Hermione, deep in the middle of her organizing project, had missed dinner entirely. Consequently, Snape hadn't seen her since breakfast, and was a trifle nervous as he climbed the stairway to the fourth floor and approached the library door, nodding sharply to Rufus Abbot who had arrived at the same time.  
  
"Good evening, sir, Professor Snape, sir," the unfortunate boy squeaked in a breaking voice, as he opened the door for Snape then followed the older man into the library. The other two students had shown up already, and had been put straight to work; wielding fluffy feather-dusters and grubby rags, already covered with dust and cobwebs, they were mostly hidden behind the huge stacks of books that completely obscured the top of the first in the series of long reading tables that ran the length of the library.   
  
"Ah, Professor," came the voice of Hermione from the top of the wall, where she was perched on one of the sliding library ladders that mounted the two-story high bookshelf. "Just in time. And Mr. Abbot, how splendid. I'll be down in just a tick and set you both to work. I can't thank you enough for volunteering to help, Professor, I have something very special in mind for you," and she gave him a wink that the students couldn't see.   
  
She still looked like a student herself, thought Snape, with a twinge of doubt. Clinging to the ladder in the gloom near the top shelf, in her faded jeans, scruffy, once-white trainers, and a snug dark red pullover, with her bushy locks secured a bit haphazardly in an elastic, Hermione scarcely fit the image molded by the previous Hogwarts librarian. He thought she looked like a little girl - until, that is, she began to descend the ladder, and the sight of her trim but deliciously rounded hips met his greedy eyes. The jeans hugged her arse smoothly, dipping down in back to reveal a flash of flawless skin below the hem of her sweater, and Snape mentally licked his lips with the thought of tracing his fingers, then his tongue, over that creamy bit of flesh as he pinned her partway up the ladder...  
  
"Wow," said Rufus' Hufflepuff mate softly, and Snape snapped out of his reverie to flare up like a fighting fish at the boy who was staring at _his_  Hermione's backside in a way no student - no other male - could ever be permitted to.   
  
"Keep your eyes on your work,  _boy_ ," he snarled, and smiled inwardly as the lad paled and ducked his head back behind the stack of dust-coated tomes.  _Good. If he so much as flicks an eyelash her way again I'll hex his testicles off._ He stepped forward to offer a polite hand as Hermione neared the bottom of the ladder. Accepting it with a whispered thanks, she sprang off to the ground gracefully and let her fingers brush his down to the tips as he released his grasp. He clamped down firmly on the stirring in his loins, and only let a tiny smirk play across his lips as she thanked him. But a moment later, she was all business, snapping orders to the students like a petite but intimidating general.  
  
"Rufus, your first job will be to remove all the books from that top shelf where I just left the ladder, bring them and stack them here on the second table. Mind you stack them in the order you pull them down, just as these have been done," and Hermione showed him the system in place on the first table. "Once they're down, they'll need to be cleaned up, which your two friends are already working on, then each needs to be cross-checked and verified against our existing catalogue. We won't reshelve yet, as these will likely be moving to a more accessible section." Once Hermione had assured herself that the three students would be able to handle the tasks at hand, she turned to Snape.   
  
"Now, Professor, I'll need your help with something a little different," and she gave a little mock scowl when his smirk deepened. "Just follow me, please."  
  
In the center of the broad, high counter by the library's entrance, Hermione had set up a detailed scale model of the library; instead of representing the individual books, each shelf section was modeled as a tiny rectangular block in one of a dozen colors, labeled with a category and number. As Snape watched, she flicked her wand and a short purple section flew off into her hand, corresponding to the rows of books the students had just brought down.   
  
"At the B.M.C.E., I was able to do this at home on my computer with a drafting program... It's a Muggle thing," she explained, "and a dead useful one at that. Fortunately the flat I lived in was over a fairly traditional patisserie, so the computer usually worked as long as I remembered to keep the batteries charged up. Of course it simply isn't an option here, there's far too much interference and I don't even know where the nearest electrical line would be. But now I'm starting to sort of enjoy the three-dimensional model, though it took some thinking about. If you notice, each block represents a different library number. I've enchanted them to grow or shrink according to the linear shelf space required by the books currently assigned to that section. The spell is indexed to the card catalogue, which is why the students are verifying each book as they go; there have been quite a few books mis-shelved or even mis-numbered!" Her indignation was genuine, and Snape admired the way her eyes widened and her cheeks got a little pink as she warmed to her subject.   
  
"As you doubtless know, we can't safely use magic to further alter the actual shelves, as so many of the books have magical properties themselves it wouldn't be stable; we're more or less bound to the physical limitations of the existing shelves, unless we have more built. So the shelves in the model are static, but we can move the book sections around as we like, right?" He nodded, finding that he was actually growing a little interested. "Now, as a student here, I spent quite a bit of time in the library --"   
  
"Surely you jest," he drawled, earning a glare.   
  
"I think there's a seat on the end table with a brass plate dedicating it to you, for all the hours you spent in it, so I really don't think you're one to talk. Now  _listen._ "   
  
"Or else...?" he purred.  
  
"Or else you'll leave when the students do tonight. So. In your many hours here, perhaps you noticed the same thing I did, which was that the books you needed most were almost always on a top shelf, or hidden behind a section on magical games for infants, or something like that. What I want you to do with the model is rearrange it. Make it your dream library. Put all the books on Herbology and history of elixirs right down front if you like, or try to think of what might have served you best when you were a student here. But change it up. I need some fresh insight; I'm just going 'round the twist trying to figure it out."   
  
"I can move it any way I like?" Snape eyed the model dubiously.  
  
"Any way you like. I have a few different arrangements I can make the model revert to, so we can compare versions. When you think you have it nicely organized, just let me know and I'll add that version to the spell. All right, then?"   
  
"What if I want to start over again?"  
  
"Just tap anywhere on the top with your wand and say  _Recurro._ "   
  
She moved off, returning to the students who were starting to whisper and slack off. Snape admired the view as she walked away, then turned his attention to the model. Within a few minutes, he was totally absorbed in rearranging the sections, and oblivious to everything around him.   
  
Hermione almost wished she had as much to distract her. Even from across the room, she had difficulty keeping her eyes off Snape, who had shown up as directed in jeans, although not in trainers but his usual soft black dragon hide boots. His jeans, black of course, hugged his narrow hips and emphasized the long, lean legs that were usually hidden under layers of wool and robing. He wore a finely woven black turtleneck that revealed surprisingly broad shoulders. All in all, she thought, he was missing his calling as a male runway model. Too thin for her taste, she would have thought, but revised her opinion when she caught herself staring at his long, slender fingers carefully manipulating the small pieces of the model. She considered offering him a hair elastic to tuck back the limp, lank, strands of jet-black hair that fell constantly into his face; but she decided he might take the gesture amiss. Then she was struck by a sudden sensory image of what that hair would look like, feel like, falling forward into her own face as he rolled her beneath him, and she had to brace herself on a nearby chair and pretend to study the nearest section of books until she trusted her legs again. She was surprised when she looked up to see the fourth-year Ravenclaw girl, Belinda Hutch, staring at  _her_  Snape with a slightly startled look of open-mouthed yearning.   
  
"Miss Hutch!" The girl gave a guilty jump, and cowered under the librarian's ferocious glare. "You are here to complete a detention, not to gape and dawdle. Unless you want to be here another night, I suggest you keep your mind and your eyes on your work."   
  
"Yes, Miss," the girl gulped, applying herself once more to the task of wiping the accumulated dust of years from the faded covers of the books stacked a metre high in front of her.   
  
Sighing, Hermione moved to the multi-drawered cabinet holding the card catalogue, opened the first drawer for the section the students were dismantling, and tried with little success to keep her own mind on her work.

  
***

  
A full hour had flown by before Snape was finally happy with his library arrangement. He gestured Hermione over with a little flourish, confident he had arrived at the best possible solution. She looked closely at the organization of the sections, then laughed as she showed him her own favorite arrangement; when she muttered  _Recurro Secundus,_  only two sections moved, trading places with one another. Snape, being taller than Hermione, had not minded placing the philosophy of magic books in a section that began several shelves up; in a location further back in the stacks, but more convenient for someone slightly below average height, he had begun the section on magical sports.   
  
"Despise Quidditch though you may, Miss Granger, you can't hope to quell the students' interest by placing it out of their reach," Snape pointed out, "and I have philosophy of magic much closer to the front of the library, which gives it greater pride of place."   
  
"True, but I would've been up and down the ladder five times a day, then, looking for what I wanted, when I was a student."  
  
"Perhaps. But your experience of the library was hardly representative, as I believe we've established." He could smell her hair, a faint hint of some vaguely floral Muggle shampoo, overlaid with a powdering of book dust. He leaned closer, trying to be inconspicuous as he sniffed.  
  
"Nor yours, and I can't imagine you spent all that much time reading about Quidditch either. Bless you." This last as he sneezed, turning his face away just in time to avoid doing so on her head. "Perhaps we should flip a Galleon to see whose version to use. They're bound to look over here some time, you know," for he was sniffing her hair again, surprising himself by boldly nuzzling it a little.   
  
"Isn't it time for them to leave, yet?" he murmured impatiently in her ear, his breath tickling the fine hairs there and sending shivers down her spine and legs.   
  
"Sadly, ahhh.... sadly, no." She pulled away reluctantly. "It's only ten o'clock. If I don't keep them at least another hour, my reputation will suffer irreparable harm."   
  
"Not as irreparable as the harm it would suffer if I lost all patience and just took you right here in the middle of the floor, students be damned."   
  
"Professor Snape, really!" Hermione tried to sound shocked, then giggled. "Dear God, I love it when you use that Potions master voice. It's a good thing for you I didn't feel this way as a student, Professor, or I might have done something rash during a detention or something and gotten you fired."  _Tit for tat_ , she thought, a quirky smile lighting up her face as she sauntered away. If he was going to make her all wet using just his voice, she would damn well give him something to think about as well. And it was only a small lie, after all; she didn't think that way about him until her seventh year, and she had in any case been far too sensible to do anything rash with him at that point.


	4. Citrus Interruptus

When the students had finally vanished down the stairs, and the library door was locked and warded, Hermione turned around to see Snape leaning back against the counter, arms folded, one lean leg crossed elegantly over the other. Her heart started pounding in her chest, an echoing throb between her legs, as their eyes met and he raised one eyebrow at her wordlessly. When he stood and began stalking towards her, she instinctively started backing up, even as she chuckled at herself for doing so.  _He's not as bad as he was during the war,_  the thought arose unbidden,  _but he's still not entirely nice..._  He did look a little as though he might bite, which she decided might not be such a bad thing, on the whole.  
  
She retreated all the way into the nearest shelf, grasping it behind her with both hands for support as he stepped in to stand over her with a predatory gleam in his eye. He took one slim hand in his and slowly raised it to the shelf by her head, pinning it there and then catching and pinning her other hand. He wanted very much to take her immediately, ravaging her mouth with his and finding the fastest way to bury himself inside her, but he forced himself to slow down. After all, he had waited for weeks, and now through this whole excruciating evening, and he fully intended to make the experience well worth the wait for them both.  
  
Her eyes flickered shut as he brought his mouth down to brush hers, tasting her lips with a flick of his tongue, keeping her pinned down when she tried to move closer. The soft, teasing contact was maddening, and Hermione moaned softly into his mouth, arching her back to bring her into more intimate contact with his body. He held back a little longer, nibbling and sucking first her lower then her upper lip, pulling away when she tried to angle for a deeper kiss. She heard a whisper she couldn't quite make out, then was startled when she felt his fingertips brushing along her jawline. When she tried to move her hands, she found them still pinned, and her eyes flew open in suspicion.   
  
"What the –" he cut her off with another brushing kiss, then murmured into her mouth as his hands began to uncoil the knot of hair and elastic at the nape of her neck.  
  
"I've waited quite a long time for this, Miss Granger, and I fully intend to enjoy every moment. Unfortunately, if you started touching me right now, I don't think I could be responsible for my self-control, so I think it best your hands remain where they are for a time," and he leaned into her, sliding her thighs apart with his knee and letting her feel the rock-hard evidence of his explanation against her stomach, before he turned his distractingly light attentions to her neck, burying his hands in her loosened curls and tickling the fine tendrils at her hairline with the tip of his oft-maligned nose.   
  
"What makes you think I'm in any better shape? Ye, Gods!" And she squirmed in frustration as his chest barely brushed her breasts through her clothes.   
  
"All the more reason to ensure you maintain some restraint," Snape smirked, trailing his fingertips down from her hair and cupping both breasts gently, pleased at the way the curves fit his hands exactly. Hermione groaned as the fabric of her bra and shirt chafed the sensitive skin, and she tried again to capture his mouth with hers as he dropped the lightest of kisses then moved on. "Trust me," he whispered into her ear, nibbling lightly and ending with a firmer nip on her earlobe that sent an almost painful jolt of arousal down both her legs.  
  
"To do what?" she laughed in a strained voice, almost sobbing with need, and then in a ragged whisper, "I've always trusted you."   
  
His eyes flew to her face, but she had her eyes closed, head thrown back against the row of books, exposing the smooth line of her throat; he could see her swallow convulsively, and the flicker of her rapid pulse below her jaw.   
  
"To do what?" He whispered back, and she blinked in surprise. He was staring at her with a wholly uncharacteristic look comprised of suspicion, horrified fascination, and a hint of yearning that had very little to do with passion. The sudden drastic shift threw her off. After taking a moment to catch her breath, she gave his question serious consideration, wiggling her fingers thoughtfully where they still rested up against the edge of the bookshelf.   
  
" _Finite Incantatum_ ," he said absentmindedly, frowning, and when her hands were free she brought them to his face, stroking his angular cheekbones and smoothing his hair behind his ears as she spoke.   
  
"I wasn't really planning to go into this just now…" Hermione saw the old, familiar, blackness begin to descend, to shroud his face once more, and with a deep breath she forged ahead bravely. "To have a hidden agenda that was good, despite your worst inclinations. To do the right thing, which seemed so much harder for you than for the others, so I admired you more for it. To be single-minded in pursuit of things you wanted. Loyal unto death… people are always saying things like they're willing to die for something, but they never really mean it. You never had to say it, you actually did it, all the time. Nobody even thanked you, really…" she smiled wistfully up at him. "You were my hero, you know. It should probably feel odd to be snogging my hero in the library, but I just want you so badly that it's crowding everything else out right now. Have I gone and spoiled it?"  
  
Her soft, anxious question had barely left her when he brought a fingertip to her mouth to silence her, and for a long moment he seemed to stare through her, clearly lost in the line of thoughts her accidental confession had triggered. Finally, he stated the obvious.   
  
"You've given this a lot of thought." His finger on her lips prevented her from answering, so she nodded, fearing what she might see in his eyes, but fearing more to look away and miss something important. He tapped her lips very gently with his fingertip once, then twice in rapid succession, his frown deepening. "You talk too much."   
  
He tapped her one more time with his tapered, pallid, finger, then leaned down to replace it with his lips in a tender kiss that seemed to stop time. It went on and on, building inexorably, their lips and tongues seeking each other out, learning each other's ways, until they both pulled back, breathless. A moment later, they flung themselves at each other again, and Snape pressed Hermione roughly into the shelf, pulling away just enough to give him access to her body, his teasing over for the nonce. He ran his hands over her breasts, around her waist, and down to cup her arse, pulling her firmly against him and plunging his tongue again and again into her eager, encouraging, mouth. She wound her fingers into his hair and pulled his head even closer, matching his urgency, and then breaking off with a gasp when he brought one hand up under her shirt, tugging her bra down on one side and cupping her, tracing a rough circle around her nipple with his thumb.  
  
Unable to resist, in one fluid motion, she pulled the shirt off over her head, the bra following within seconds as he continued to weigh and caress first one breast, then the other. With agonizing patience, he kissed and licked his way down her neck and over her flushed chest, finally placing his lips over one rosy areola and beginning to suckle gently, rolling the other nipple with his dextrous fingers in a matching rhythm as Hermione whimpered in appreciation. Her hands played over his stooped shoulders, gripping and releasing them, pulling his sweater up to feel the smooth skin and hard, long, muscles beneath. Finally, needing to feel his skin against hers, she broke the delicious contact with his mouth and yanked his sweater off, throwing it next to hers on the floor and pressing up against him firmly, finding herself at eye level with his shoulders. She ducked her head, experimentally licked the tip of his nipple, and was rewarded with a shudder and a throaty growl.   
  
Her fingers trailed over his chest and lightly muscled abdomen, feeling the finely raised scars that marred his pale, sallow, skin and dug thin roads through the light layer of hair. To Snape's amazement, Hermione moved her mouth over his chest, pressing gentle kisses to each scar she could find. She winced when she felt her way around to his back, to the reminders of deeper wounds. He was too thin, always, and his flat muscles did little to hide the fact that some of the wounds had cut nearly to the bone. Hermione slid her arms further around him, hugging him tightly, and he suddenly felt some tension in himself, some ancient grief he hadn't even realized was buried there, well up from his soul and release itself in a wholly novel wave of gratitude and affection. She held him a moment longer, softly stroking his back from shoulders to waist, and then pulled back with a rueful little chuckle and scooped up their fallen clothes from the floor.  
  
"You know, I had visions of us having our lascivious way with one another right here in the library, but at this point I really think it would make it too hard to concentrate on my work later on if I'm remembering this every time I walk past the Astromancy section. Would you consider it hopelessly unromantic of me if I suggested we move… this… to my quarters?" Hermione smiled, a bit sheepishly. "Also, for some reason I just really fancy the idea of us being in a bed."  
  
"Hermione, I assure you that at this stage, romance is the furthest thing from my mind." He eyed her nude torso with a possessive leer, eliciting a laugh.   
  
"Come on then," she said, "My quarters are connected through the back office. And do me a favor, later on when you're in here looking something up, and I'm trying to work, just please don't remind me that I was ever leading you around the library half-naked like a randy teenager?"  
  
"Miss Granger," he purred, allowing her to pull him along by the hand, "you should know by now that I will take every opportunity to use this interlude to my advantage later on. Including whispering in your ear when the students aren't looking, and reminding you about how I very nearly ravaged you up against the bookshelf." Her stomach did a slow flip, and she almost reconsidered her position, but decided that all else being equal, they would truly be more at ease in bed. 

  
***

  
Later on, Severus would find Hermione's quarters extremely inviting and comfortable. He would admire the pair of soft, distressed-leather, overstuffed wing chairs that nestled by the fire with a good-sized round table between them. He would be quietly enchanted by the feel and muted colors of the Aubusson rug that softened the stone floor, and the somewhat daring post-modern painting over the mantel. And, of course, he would be thrilled by her book collection, rivaling his own in both quantity and variety, housed in floor-to-ceiling shelves on every wall of the sitting room and adjacent dining nook. Later, he would do all those things.   
  
For now, however, all Severus noticed was that after Hermione opened the door to her bedroom (more bookshelves), and flicked her wand to bring a few candles to life, she then turned the wand on herself and whispered  _Divestio_. He stepped behind her suddenly naked body, his slightly cooled lust instantly roaring back to full burn, and ran his passion-warmed hands slowly down her back, circling her hips and tugging her into his chest, then sliding around and up to fondle both breasts, stroking the sensitive undersides and again teasingly avoiding the nipples. She let her head loll back, and he dipped down to bite her neck gently, then lick playfully at the tender curves of her ear. He felt her hands reach behind her, trying to slide between them and get at the zip to his jeans.  
  
"Not yet," he said dryly, "these are the only thing keeping my control intact at the moment… and I have a few other plans, first."   
  
He spun her around and backed her up to the bed as he had the library bookshelf, smiling quite wickedly. His features looked somewhat cruel, as always, but Hermione found it only excited her now. He picked her up around the waist and dumped her unceremoniously onto the bed, toppling her backwards with a push and capturing her legs in both arms as she giggled and struggled unsuccessfully for balance. And then stopped struggling almost at once, as he tipped her feet up onto his shoulders and began kissing his way down from her ankles, alternating from the inside of one leg to the back of another as her giggles slowly subsided and transformed into fitful cries of growing need. He bent down and pulled her forward a little as he knelt between her legs, rubbing his cheek against one silken inner thigh. The first hint of his warm breath on her core almost undid her, and she arched her hips towards him, longing for the ministrations of his teasing mouth.   
  
It was at this moment Snape began regretting his decision not to pin Hermione to the library shelf and shag her silly when he had the chance. This moment, when a green flash of activated Floo from the next room announced the arrival of a visitor. Hermione cursed under her breath, grabbing the blanket off the bed and flinging it over Snape's head in an instinctive but pointless effort to hide him as she leapt to her feet and scrabbled around for something to wear. A man's voice called softly, near the slightly open door, "'Ermione? Dormes-tu, ma petite Reine des Livres? Alors, est-ce que tu veux que je parte et revienne plus tard ?  
  
"What the bloody hell?" sputtered Snape, clawing the thick, woolen, blanket away from his face and glaring at Hermione in indignation and gathering rage as she frantically shushed him.  
  
"No, no, Robert, it's fine. You've forgotten the time difference, though. Welcome back. Give me just a moment!" she called sweetly, finally locating the robes she had left draped over a small side chair next to the bed, and flinging them on. After a final threatening glare and vigourous shushing to the enraged Potions master still kneeling on the floor next to her bed, Hermione swept through the door with a warm smile and arms stretched wide to greet her midnight visitor. 


	5. Lost in Translation

Laughing. He could hear them out there, and each time a laugh rang out it enraged Snape further. A sudden spate of French from  _him_ , a mixture of French and English from Hermione, and then,  _ha ha!_  they laughed.   
  
 _This is bloody fucking unbelievable! I'm stuck in here while she's out there telling jokes with some fucking French nancy boy?! What the bloody hell is going on?! What is she playing at?_    
  
"You did? Oh,  _unintelligible frog gibberish_ , that's brilliant! And for only two hundred Galleons?" Hermione sounded completely at ease, chatting with the Frenchman.  _She's chatting. CHATTING. How dare she?_  
  
Snape stood up and paced, his forgotten erection sinking slowly, resignedly, as he crossed to the narrow window and back again, trying to stay out of the line of sight left by the still partially-open door.  _She could have at least closed it. Damn, bloody, oh, fucking hell! She's been playing me for a fool. I can't believe I let myself get involved in this, brain in my bloody trousers, what a pathetic sap._  Snape grabbed up his shirt from the floor, jerking his head into it and immediately getting stuck in the inside-out turtleneck and tangled sleeves.   
  
He was still standing in this ignominious position, one arm trapped in the shirt and the other attempting ineffectually to free his head from its binding knit prison, when he heard another burst of giggling Frenglish chatter from Hermione followed by the squeak of the door swinging open. The shirt did nothing to muffle the two startled gasps, nor the girlish snicker and dry Gallic chuckle that told Snape they were both in the doorway. Looking at him. With his sweater stuck over his face. Of course.  
  
 _I hate her. So. Much._  
  
"Severus? Erm, I wanted you to meet someone. Can you... come out?" A fresh wave of hilarity overtook Hermione and the unknown Frenchman, doing nothing for Snape's mood.   
  
 _Somebody is going to die painfully for this. I didn't attend all those Death Eater meetings for nothing, you know._  He finally managed to yank the traitorous garment over his head and dash it ferociously to the floor, letting his unbridled rage leap at last from his terrifying countenance to sear and crush the very bones of the... two-hundred-year-old French midget currently standing in Hermione's bedroom doorway.   
  
 _If Dumbledore and Flitwick ever bred, their offspring would look exactly like that,_  the thought popped up in Snape's mind. He would be neither the first, nor the last, to think so.   
  
Now completely and utterly nonplussed, Snape stood in stony silence and glowered at Hermione and the tiny Frenchman with absolutely no idea what to expect next. Were Hermione to whisk into the sitting room and procure a brace of flying tortoises to frolic about the room in an impromptu tango, he would hardly feel more disoriented than he did at the current moment.   
  
" _More incomprehensible French nonsense,"_  said the two-hundred-year-old French midget to Hermione, with what was clearly great wit, sagacity, and charm.  
  
"Oh, of course. And, you know, the French are so much more sensible about all that than the English. Oh, I've forgotten my manners, though, please forgive me. Let's all step back into the sitting room, for one thing, if you please. Now, Robert, this is Professor Severus Snape, the Potions master here and the author of that article on seawater-grown potion ingredients you were just praising so highly," Hermione turned brightly to Snape. "And Professor Snape, this is Monsieur Robert de Sortilege, the director of the B.M.C.E. and apparently quite a fan of yours."   
  
"It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Monsieur," de Sortilege greeted Snape in barely accented English. "As our 'Ermione says, I am indeed a 'fan' of your research. The potions are a, a... " His very gesture, asking Hermione to supply him the word, managed to convey eloquence, even as he stammered.   
  
"Hobby?" she offered.  
  
"Oui, exactement, merci, a hobby of mine. I enjoy your articles very much." The miniscule Parisian bibliophile completed his graceful gesture and seemed to settle his rich, scarlet red robes around him with an air of total satisfaction.   
  
"You're too kind." Snape suddenly realized he was actually talking to the man who controlled the largest library within several thousand miles. "You're too kind," he repeated, this time without the sarcasm. "And, I might add, I am also a fan of yours. Your library houses the finest collection of Potions texts in the world."   
  
The wizened gentleman beamed, but shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly.   
  
"One day, Monsieur, we must talk about the potions, non? But tonight, I learn from ma petite Reine des Livres that I have misjudged the time, and I shall now go and leave you to your pursuits. Tomorrow, un hibou, 'Ermione, oui?" He turned fondly to Hermione to embrace her, ending with a kiss on each cheek. The little man had a mischievous glint in his eye as he gave Snape a pointed look, turned back and said something else in rapid French that made Hermione laugh out loud again, then winked as he tottered to the fireplace and took up a handful of Floo powder from the earthenware jar on the mantel.  
  
"A bientot," he tossed over his shoulder as he tossed the powder into the hearth, stepped in, and Flooed away.   
  
"Goodnight, Robert," Hermione called after him fondly.   
  
When she turned around to face Snape, sighing a happy little sigh, she was greeted with a quite gruesome expression. Hermione hadn't seen Snape wear such a sour look since her seventh year, and she felt a momentary flutter of anxiety, almost a sense memory of being subjected to that look as a student. Her automatic response was one of defiance, but she clamped down firmly on that childish first impulse.   
  
"He forgot the time difference," she said, somewhat feebly. "He'd been in New Orleans, you see, visiting his youngest great-great-granddaughter Angelique, she's - I think I've mentioned, my American contact? The one who sent the periodicals?- she works for the American magical authority, the Department. They have a large library there, near New Orleans. Anyway, she's a text restorer and does some rare book authentification. She had found a book for me, something I've been wanting a copy of for quite some time, so on his way back to Paris..." Hermione scrutinized Snape's face, trying to pin down his expression. He looked just as he might if he had discovered, halfway through preparing a complicated and exacting solution, that a key ingredient was in fact spoiled, ruining the entire thing. Disgust, and the feeling of having wasted time and effort, that was what she saw, and it filled her with anxiety.   
  
"I certainly hope you enjoyed your little jokes at my expense, Miss Granger. You won't get another opportunity, I assure you." His voice was soft, but clamped-down, intense, as if he was constraining himself to this near-whisper only to avoid screaming at her. In stunned and uncomprehending silence, Hermione watched him step back into the bedroom, snatch up his crumpled shirt, and make his way out.  
  
"Severus, it wasn't like that. Severus, wait - " The door slammed behind him, and he was gone, leaving her alone, bereft, and very, very, frustrated. 

  
***

  
Snape knew he'd been a prat.   
  
At some level, he knew that his leaving had little to do with any real or imagined slight from the obviously congenial and benevolent de Sortilege, and everything to do with his sudden terror at realizing how jealous he had been. In a few short weeks, without even having bedded the girl, he was brought to a place where his emotions seemed suddenly too much with him. Emotions he'd spent most of his life working to suppress, to sublimate, to turn to his own purposes or to forget altogether. Emotions he usually felt  _able to control_.   
  
He realized he was trembling, and stopped walking, leaning his forehead for a moment on the cool stone of the nearest wall. The hallway was silent, the only sound his breathing. He tried to clear his mind, to think of nothing, but simply to be, a discipline he had learned through bitter experience. Snape concentrated on the silence, on the slightly damp feel and slightly dank smell of the stone beneath his skin, on the blue quality of the moonlight streaming in through the nearest window, which he could just see from the corner of his eye. It was bright enough to cast sharp shadows, he observed dispassionately. After a minute, feeling not much calmer but at least no longer fraught enough to shake, he tugged his shirt right-side out and pulled it over his head. This time, the process went smoothly. Working a few stray strands of hair up out of the high neck, Snape continued his weary, lonely, descent to the dungeons. 


	6. The Once and Future Fling

"Oh, dear," said Dumbledore softly to McGonagall, who followed his gaze down the table to where Hermione sat alone. "I was afraid something like this might happen."   
  
"I don't know what you were thinking, in the first place, Albus, encouraging her like that. You know what they're both like." Minerva buttered her toast neatly and precisely, dropping no crumbs as she lifted it to her mouth.   
  
"Still, I expect it will all work out in the end. These things usually do." The old man sipped thoughtfully at a goblet of pumpkin juice.   
  
"Perhaps. And I would be the first to wish them both well." Minerva's prim mouth twitched into a tight little smile. "But the real question is, will there still be a school left standing by the time they've sorted the whole thing out?"

  
***

  
Meanwhile, in her self-selected chair at the High Table, Hermione was simmering. This, had Albus and Minerva but known it, was in fact a vast improvement. In the wee hours of that morning, Hermione had been at full boil, although it had taken her some time to heat up to that point.   
  
At first, when Severus left, she was merely bewildered. She knew he'd been caught off guard, both by the sudden intrusion of a guest, and by having been seen in such an embarrassing state of half-undress. It was true, Snape had looked silly, and although Hermione had regretted laughing, he could hardly blame her. She had just been taken by surprise. So she reasoned, and concluded thereby that his reaction was unreasonable.   
  
 _If he had only let me explain..._  but he had stormed off without listening to a word, and this more than anything began to rankle with Hermione. And the more she kept thinking about it, the more it rankled. Soon enough, she found herself storming down to the dungeon, hell-bent on confronting Snape and telling him exactly what he could do with himself, as he was no longer intending to do it with her.  
  
But pounding on Snape's office door, and on the section of Potions classroom wall she knew was really the warded and disguised door to his quarters, only yielded her a bruised fist and an even fouler mood. She banged at each spot for several minutes, but answer came there none. Eventually, exhausted and frustrated, she left the dungeon hall with a parting kick (immediately regretted) to the office door. She had only the dismal satisfaction of knowing she could safely attend the morning meal in the Great Hall, as he would surely stay far, far, away.  _Coward._  
  
And now, at breakfast, she burned steadily, tending her anger like a campfire, keeping it banked and low and ready for when she needed it. 

  
***

  
Snape knew he couldn't hide forever. For one thing, his class schedule was public knowledge. Furthermore, at some point Albus would insist he be seen in the Great Hall for meals again, and he would have to come out of the dungeon. But he doubted he would have to wait that long, before she came looking for him again. He ate his lonely breakfast with some trepidation, holed up in his quarters and dreading the confrontation he knew was inevitable.   
  
When Monday morning came, he was not surprised at all to see Hermione lurking in the back of his first-year Potions class. He was not surprised when she worked her way around the tables to stand before the back door through to his office, cutting off his best escape route. It startled Snape not in the least to hear the classroom door click shut behind the last student to exit, and hear her locking and warding it.   
  
What did surprise Snape was the realization that, as he stood behind his desk and bent to pick up the stack of completed essays, he was unable to move his hands from the desktop. He yanked backwards, trying to pull away from the desk, but he might as well have had his hands glued there. As indeed, magically speaking, they were.   
  
"Right. Turn about is fair play," said Hermione crisply from behind him where she still stood by the door. She walked around the desk to face him, leaning in across the broad surface in unconscious mimicry of his position. "I've a few things to say to you, and you're going to stay and listen, whether you want to or not."  
  
"Miss Granger -" he began sharply.  
  
"Don't you 'Miss Granger' me, Severus. The last time we met I was voluntarily and quite happily naked, and you were very nearly so. Naked, that is. You were already as happy as I suppose you're capable of being. And nobody forced you into that situation, so don't you dare act as if I'm the only one responsible." He glowered his response, and she matched him, glare for glare.  
  
"I had planned to frame this in terms much more flattering to you, but seeing you makes me angry all over again, so I feel much less inclined to take that trouble. So I'm just going to tell you, straight out, that I think you've been an absolute git. Yes, it's true; I threw a blanket over your head to hide you. Yes, I let Robert see you with that ridiculous sweater over your face. And yes, I laughed, because it startled me to see you like that and it just looked very, very, funny. But Robert only came to the doorway because he heard me gasp and thought something was wrong. And the only reason I hid you like that, and then stood there talking to Robert like a twit, was that for a few minutes I felt like a guilty teenager whose father had just walked into the house ahead of schedule. For Merlin's sake, Severus, he was my employer and my mentor for years, and I was horrified to imagine what he would think of me if he knew I had a Man In My Room. But of course he's French, and he's no fool; he knew I had a man in my room. He had just been saying the most complimentary things about this article by my Hogwarts colleague, and I suddenly wanted so much for you two to meet.   
  
"But then you got so embarrassed, because YOU," she jabbed at him with an emphatic finger, "have no sense of humor about yourself. That shirt was very funny, I tell you. But if you had just moved past that, we could have said goodbye to Robert, and then gone back to my room and spent the whole weekend having lots of lovely sex. Except that you had to go and ruin it by being such a colossal, self-conscious, idiot." With each point she made, she shook her finger right in his face, until she was nearly making contact with his prominent nose.   
  
"Release. Me. At. Once." Snape spat out, his usually pallid face turning livid with rage.   
  
"Won't." Hermione stood up, folding her arms and contemplating him like a somewhat troubling specimen, cocking her head to one side and chewing contemplatively on her lower lip. "Not until I feel we've made some progress. It wouldn't be fair to either of us. And besides, you're too angry right now. If I let you go, you would hex me. It may have been a bit reckless to bind you in the first place, but I'm no fool."   
  
"Let me go this instant, Miss Granger, or you will discover just how great a fool you are," Snape said in his quietest, most sinister voice.   
  
Hermione ignored him. She had heard it before.  
  
"Still, you do look a trifle uncomfortable leaning over like that." She moved around the desk, pushing his chair into the back of his knees so he was forced to sit down. "There, that's much better. And stop calling me Miss Granger, I've told you. You'll never get free doing that."   
  
Hermione circled back around the desk, watching Snape as he watched her. She could almost see his Slytherin brain set itself to work, and she knew her only hope lay in leading his thoughts away from plotting her own painful demise. With that aim, she pulled up a chair opposite his and sat facing him across the desk, her elbows propped up, determined chin resting on her hands.   
  
"Did you really think I wanted to ridicule you?" she asked after a moment. Snape's eyes narrowed at her, then he looked pointedly away, fixing his gaze somewhere across the classroom, and sighed extravagantly. "I see. Well, you were wrong to think so, because all I really wanted to do was get rid of Robert so I could continue getting you out of your clothes. I've already explained why I reacted as I did at first, and I am deeply sorry for any embarrassment you may have suffered. But please consider what your own reaction might be if Dumbledore suddenly popped into your room when you were about to have a sex act performed on you." His nostrils flared, and she knew she'd hit close to the mark. "An act I was looking forward to very much, I might add." She smirked, leaning in a little closer, and said in a huskier voice, "And looking forward to reciprocating. In a somewhat leisurely, but nevertheless enthusiastic, fashion." His eyes shot towards hers again, involuntarily, one eyebrow raised sharply.   
  
"I see I have your attention."  
  
"What is it you want from me, Miss Gra -" At her warning sound, he stopped, but couldn't bring himself to say her name.   
  
"I want to have sex with you. I thought I had made that abundantly clear. Say what you like about workplace involvements, we're going to be colleagues for a long time, and I don't intend to spend what may be a lifetime lusting after you silently. But first, I want to know why you really left. It wasn't that bad, or that humiliating, not really. And Robert paid you such a compliment. You knew I wanted you. I thought he would leave, I would apologize, we would have a laugh, and then... so, why?"  
  
Snape pulled again at his invisible fetters, feeling miserable. He would have rather been boiled in oil than discuss his feelings with anyone, much less Hermione Granger. Once again, however, his body showed more intelligence than his brain, and his hardening penis began thinking for him. He sounded a little frantic, and more pathetic than he would have liked, when he finally blurted, "I was jealous."  
  
Seeing Hermione's jaw drop, then seeing her burst into near-hysterical laughter, had an immediate chilling effect on Snape's nascent erection and his fragile ego.   
  
"You were - but he's - oh, gods, he's like a cross between Dumbledore and Flitwick!" And she doubled over as another wave of hilarity overtook her. "Not, oh, that I don't admire his mind tremendously." She gasped for breath and fanned herself, still giggling despite her efforts to stop. "But honestly, if you're representative of my type, would you really suppose that I would be interested in-"  
  
"Not once I saw him!" Snape yelled, feeling less in control of the situation than ever.  
  
"But then, if you didn't feel that way once you saw him... oh. Oh, I see." Hermione grew thoughtful, chewing on her lip again.   
  
"You see what," he sneered, "that you've accomplished your goal of humiliating me? That the bat of the dungeons has feelings to be hurt? Don't flatter yourself by reading any deeper meaning into my departure; I simply realized how completely inadvisable it was to pursue intimacy with someone such as yourself."  
  
"Such as myself? Such as what, exactly?"  
  
"A work colleague. A headstrong, immature, child. A foolish - what the hell are you doing?" For Hermione had risen from her seat, kicked off her shoes, and begun, almost casually, to remove her robe.   
  
"Just getting comfortable. Go ahead. Don't let me stop you. You were calling me an immature child," she responded coolly, beginning to unbutton the white silk blouse revealed by the discarded robe.  
  
"Why are you doing this?" He said hoarsely, then cleared his throat. His eyes hadn't left her hands and the increasing swath of bared skin beneath.  
  
"Do you honestly think my mind will be changed by such a blatant display of... uh. Uhhhh."   
  
"Display of what? I didn't quite catch that?" She had unclasped the front fastening of her bra and moved one hand under the peach-colored silk, playing idly with the already erect bud of one breast while her other hand continued down her stomach to unfasten the catch of her trousers. "Do you know what your problem is, Severus," she murmured, never pausing in her tasks, "You think too much. I may talk too much, I grant you that. But my talking too much is no match for your thinking too much."   
  
Shrugging out of her shirt, and shucking off her navy trousers, Hermione paced around the desk, pleased to note Snape's eyes were now trained avidly on her. Standing beside him in the unfastened bra, tiny peach silk knickers, and a garter belt that held up stockings too sheer to hide anything, she felt absurdly powerful. A power she might not approve of, a uniquely feminine power that nice Muggle-born girls were usually raised to feel uncomfortable with, but a primal force nevertheless. The magical world had always recognized the link between magic and sex, and as strong as Hermione's magic was, she had been in some ways bound to explore the relationship eventually. Spending a few years in Paris had done wonders for her confidence in that regard, not to mention for her lingerie wardrobe.  
  
Hermione ducked under Severus' right arm, and gracefully slipped into his lap, straddling him boldly. Feeling the evidence that he was, indeed, paying close attention, she smiled cheekily. Moving her hips against him rhythmically, she asked, "If I let you go, are you going to hex me?"   
  
"Not before I shag you." He admitted, then moaned and tried to arch closer to the maddening warmth and pressure she was applying.   
  
"That's as good as I can hope for, I suppose." He didn't want to think about where she'd been hiding her wand, but she produced it and spoke the counter-charm, then let it fall to the desk with a clatter as his arms clenched around her. "If I agree to stop talking, will you agree to stop thinking?"


	7. Unfading the Fade-to-Black

_"That's as good as I can hope for, I suppose." He didn't want to think about where she'd been hiding her wand, but she produced it and spoke the counter-charm, then let it fall to the desk with a clatter as his arms clenched around her. "If I agree to stop talking, will you agree to stop thinking?"_  
  
  
By way of answer, Snape's mouth closed on hers, devouring it as his hands moved spasmodically over her nearly nude body, frantically clutching at every inch he could reach. He grasped her legs, wrapping them around his waist, then lurched upward and deposited her on the desk, kicking the chair out from behind him as he rose. The homework scrolls flew everywhere, forgotten, as he bent her back over the broad, mahogany surface, his stance briefly echoing his earlier, involuntary hunch. He tried to catch his breath, and the room slowly swam back into focus as his panting slowed. Hermione's eyes had closed, but Snape stared down at the lush sight before him, taking in the bra, unfastened but still clinging over her nipples, the taut stomach with a tiny mole just to the right of the navel, and the miniscule scraps of peach silk that functioned as knickers and a garter belt. Releasing her legs, he let his fingers trace a delicate, teasing path from her throat, down over her chest, following the faint lacework of blue veins he saw beneath her milky, velvety, skin. With infinite care, he lifted the cups of the bra away from her breasts, and saw her little hitch of breath when he brushed the tips of her nipples before moving on. His long, elegant, fingers splayed out over her ribcage and slid down to span her waist. Snape leaned over her again, as his hands continued down to stroke her hips and tease along the straps of the garter belt. Hermione gasped when she felt his teeth graze the silk over her mound.  
  
"I believe we were just about here when we were so rudely interrupted," he growled, his low velvety voice arousing Hermione as much as his talented hands. Not to be outdone, his hand worked their way around the clasps to her garters and neatly unhooked them, front and back, in two swift motions. Startled, Hermione looked up at him for a moment with a puzzled expression. He merely smirked in reply, and with a wicked grin bent over her sex once more and pressed his open lips to the silk, felling her with a wave of hot breath. Hermione moaned aloud, tossing her head back, and bucking her hips toward him, evidently no longer caring why he knew how to undo garters more easily than she. _Thank the Gods for all that puerile homoerotic cross-dressing that passes for hazing in Slytherin. It might seem pointless at the time, but it's so true what they say… education is never wasted,_  and with that thought Snape tugged at her knickers, sliding them off smoothly, then pulled one slim thigh over each shoulder as he knelt and faced his quarry once more.   
  
Hermione felt drugged with pleasure, barely able to move as he worked his way with kisses, licks, and tiny nips up one quivering thigh, finally nuzzling the nutmeg-colored curls on her mons with his substantial nose while he teased her lower regions with the tip of his tongue. His hands, curled around and over each thigh, pulled her legs further apart with a gentle but insistent pressure. Reaching blindly for anything, Hermione's hands found Snape's hair and twined there just as Snape turned his head, kissing her passionately on the nether lips. Her cry turned to a groan when his tongue dipped inside her, her hands clutched at his hair, and she tried to twist closer even as he pulled away to tease her further.   
  
Snape grew harder with each little incoherent cry and moan he drew from Hermione, and he realized he couldn't continue to tease her indefinitely without driving himself to distraction as well. He finally brought his tongue up to lick her clitoris lightly, teasing no more. With one finger, he stroked the petal-like folds edging her opening, watching her face as he suddenly plunged the long digit inside and gave her clit a firm suck. When she gasped, and her hips began flexing against his hand, he began to thrust harder, alternating licks and suckling on her sensitive bud, reveling in her lack of control. When a second finger joined the first, she came hard with his name on her lips, tugging his hair and bucking wildly under his mouth and hand. He eased his ministrations, bringing her down slowly, until she sat up. Flushed and panting, she dragged his head up, kissing him desperately while she tried to unfasten the buttons over his rampant erection.   
  
Snape gently pushed her hands away and freed himself, only to feel her grasp him tightly and maneuver him toward her opening.   
  
"Open your eyes," he said suddenly, pulling back a little. He covered her hand with his, raising his other hand towards her face and tipping it up, so she was forced to look at him. Once her eyes blinked open and met his, he moved closer, pulling her legs around his waist once more and, this time, picking her up. Turning, he took two strides to the wall behind his desk, and braced her up against it. She could feel the hard, cold stones pressing into her back, his warm robes and firm chest moving with each heavy breath, and the tantalizing silken warmth of his penis teasing the underside of one buttock. Shifting a little, she reached around her leg to guide him into her, and he lowered her slightly until he could thrust upward and into the delicious, warm, haven of her cunt.   
  
He thrust slowly at first, learning the feel of her, and then more forcefully, bending his knees and driving towards the wall. The angle brought the rough wool of his trousers into contact with Hermione's sensitized nub again and again, and she quickly found herself at the edge once more. When her eyes fluttered shut, and she whispered his name, Severus could wait no longer. He buried his face in her neck and began to thrust still harder, sparing nothing, feeling a surge of elation as Hermione came around him, nearly screaming. As she shuddered, his hips began to move more spasmodically, and his own pleasure overtook him; calling her name roughly once, then again, he jerked upward in triumph and spent himself inside her with a final, quaking, groan.   
  
Both gasping, sweating even in the dungeon cool, they remained locked together, unable to think or move. After a long moment, they looked at each other in awe. For a change, and only for a moment, Snape looked gobsmacked, and Hermione wore a smirk.   
  
"So are you going to hex me now?" She asked cheekily, and he pulled out of her with a rude pop. She grimaced and lowered her legs to the floor shakily. He pulled the chair towards them and sat down hard, pulling her into his lap and playing idly with her breasts, a moody expression drawing itself over his face.   
  
"No," he said finally, with a thoughtful frown. "I don't think that will be necessary. I think it will suffice to take you back to my quarters, chain you to the bed, and make you my sexual slave."   
  
"You mean when your legs are working again,  _Professor_?"   
  
"Hermione!"  
  
"What?" She asked innocently.  
  
"You're sitting in my lap, essentially naked, having just let me shag you up against the classroom wall. The classroom where I taught you for seven years, and where I still teach every day. Remember how you felt about the library. Do you really think you should draw further attention to the particulars of the situation by using my title?"   
  
"Oh, dear. I think I see what you mean." Hermione looked up at him coyly, biting her lip in that way she had. "I have been a very bad girl indeed, Professor. Perhaps I should just put my uniform back on and go, then." She tried to stand but he tightened his arms around her. "Unless you had a little special detention in mind?"   
  
With a growl, Snape stood and lifted Hermione over one shoulder, holding her firmly around the knees. She squealed, but only pretended to beat a protest on his back and kick her bestockinged feet, as he opened the disguised portal that led to his private quarters and carried her through to his bedroom.   
  
"Detention obviously isn't sufficient, Miss Granger," he purred as he flung her on the bed and flipped her onto her stomach before she could escape. "What you clearly need is… a thorough spanking!"


	8. Epilogue: The Everlasting Yes

Snape stood at the high counter at the front of the library, his dark, sleek head bent towards the lighter, bushier one of the librarian with whom he appeared to be arguing. Her finger repeatedly stabbed toward an open book on the counter, and he repeatedly shook his head. He turned a page, gestured towards it, and smirked as she threw her hands up in the air with evident disgust. Then, strangely, she looked at the clock on the wall, and turned back to Snape with a smile, seeming to ask him something. He nodded, rapped his knuckles thoughtfully on the countertop and glanced at the clock himself before waving a hand towards the roped-off portion of the library stacks. Hermione rolled her eyes and gave her head a little shake, though with a fondly tolerant expression, and began making preparations to close up the library for the evening. Neither of them was aware of being under close scrutiny.  
  
 _Poor Severus. He's never going to convince her to let him into the Restricted Section. And chances are he'll never find a way to use the password himself. Perhaps I'll just bring him in with me, it would be the decent thing to do._  McGonagall had come up to the library to consult a rare Transfiguration text regarding a private project, and had been watching what she deemed was Snape's transparent attempt to taunt the impressionable young librarian into allowing him to circumvent the password and enter. She knew her former student needed no protection from the Potions master, but it still irked her to see Hermione being put upon by the dour bat. She privately wondered if Albus was slipping a bit.  _The decent thing to do,_  she reminded herself, and strode towards the Restricted Section.  
  
McGonagall neared the rope just as Snape swooped to a stop in front of it, and she was just close enough to hear him whisper the password with a smirk. In astonishment, she saw the rope lift and allow him entry. His face, as he passed by and gave her a little nod, was a study in self-satisfaction.   
  
 _Like the kneazle who got the cream,_  McGonagall thought, her puzzlement lasting only until she looked over and saw the expression on Hermione's face. The erstwhile Gryffindor exuded a smugness that McGonagall rightly suspected had little to do with the papers she was stacking neatly on the desk.  _And there's the cream,_  McGonagall thought, and almost caught herself snickering.   
  
She quietly followed the students out of the library, deciding to forego her research for the evening. She would try her luck in the Restricted Section another time.  _Perhaps now meals will be bearable again,_  she thought, a little spring in her step as she went to find Albus and tell him that once again, as usual, he had been absolutely right. 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Bookish](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4830035) by [swooning](https://archiveofourown.org/users/swooning/pseuds/swooning)




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